Google Product Search Becomes Google Shopping – A Paid Service

Google Product Search Becomes Google Shopping

Google product search has been a stalwart of online shopping for some years now, since 2002 when it was called Froogle in fact, but the process behind it is changing. It’s a big change that will have a substantial impact on merchants and shoppers alike.

Google Shopping

Google Shopping, as it will be called from the end of 2012, is designed around a commercial model based on product listing advertisements. Creating this commercial relationship between merchants and customers will encouragthe merchants to offer higher quality data and keep all info up to date. The latest price changes, new offers and changes to postage details are all essential information that consumers need to know in order to buy with confidence and these will be much easier to access with Google Shopping in its new format.

The main difference between Google Product Search and Google Shopping is that only merchants who pay-to-play will be listed in Shopping. Google explained this move by stating that this move “is about delivering the best answers for people searching for products and helping connect merchants with the right customers” and therefore the merchants that are willing to pay will be more trustworthy and this will improve the online shopping experience for its users.

Trusted Stores Program

This trustworthiness of merchants can be increased by them joining joining Google’s groundbreaking Trusted Stores program, which along with joining Google Shopping will give them the best possible rating that merchants can get through the Google search engine. This will in turn benefit the customers as they are shopping with confidence and the more trustworthy merchants will get the business they deserve.

This Paid Inclusion Model that Google has set up will not guarantee that merchant’s products will rank well for any particular keywords, working similarly to how Product Listing Ads works now, they won’t be bidding to show up for particular terms, but instead merchants will bid on how much they’d be willing to pay to show up in searches and get clicks. This will split the impetus between bid price and the merchants SEO profile.